Parallel Processing and Historical data

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OK, this is odd, but I was just reminded of this odd paradox tonight. This happened to me TWICE! Anyway, I wonder what YOU think of it. Does this happen to you?

1. It is almost like I have two threads of thought going when listening to people sometimes. This I KNOW is popular here. It is apparently what is known as CAPD. The first thread interprets the sentence, and fails, and starts my mouth saying "excuse me?" or "what?", etc... Meanwhile, the second one is STILL processing and often within the first sylable of the statement, I realize what was said, try to stop the statement, and say OH, OK, etc....

2. I may talk about a fact that happened at some distant time and, meanwhile, almost remind MYSELF that there was new info. Today, for example, I was talking about a law passed 2 years ago, and FORGOT that a year ago it was revised to allow states to set their own laws. I eventually remembered that.

Neither of these is anything I am concious of. I know I was thinking about it only because I got the result. Both of these are kind of embarassing, but it is interesting given the idea that people with AS supposedly can't multitask.

Maybe the Frontal executive processing doesn't lock things properly. Sometimes it works TOO WELL, providing the slow, methodical, precise, results, and other times it fails, providing the social problems, literal interpretations, and the examples shown above. It is like the interleaving/wait states on a computer. You can set them such that processing can be a lot faster, but there is a greater chance of error.

I do this all the time. People get quite annoyed with me.

the missus tries to pass it off as selective aphasia...or more succinctly "You're just not listening!"
I've noticed that I miss people's names during introductions, my ears shut down or something...

When I'm communicating with someone, these are the threads of thought my mind is simultaneously processing:

- Listening to what is being said
- Monitoring how I'm listening (try to keep eye contact, do I have the correct facial expression, the social cues of their expressions, etc, etc)
- Calculating my understanding of what is being said
- Digging up memories/facts pertinent to the subject (including filtering what is useful, out-dated and current)
- Preparing for my response
- Responding
- Staying on track with my response (and not letting random thoughts or excessive details sidetrack me)
- Monitoring how I'm responding (same concerns as listed above for listening)
- Rating the success of the communication exchange
- Imprinting what I think I did right and wrong in the exchange

Sound insane?

And while all of that is going on, I (of course) inadvertently end up missing some things or quickly forgetting others.

I'm funny, smart, charming and approachable - people genuinely love to connect with me, and I'm sure they assume my outgoing nature comes easily.

BUT BUT BUT - No one has an atom of an idea how exhausting socializing is for me!! I love it...wish it came easier...most of the time, though, I can't help but withdraw into my world and pass on the mental taxation.

Drollchick,

Well, I kind of do that also, but it seems like most do to some degree. I just wanted to cover the seemingly more obscure and problematic things.

Gottcha - yes.

My long-winded, over-detailed way of saying that I do experience both of your points in my my thought processes - too much mental multitasking with a higher percentage rate of error.

Parallel and Historical Data topics

AngelUndercover and Zukenkerl are bang on with this one. I like their analyses and explanations.

In addition perhaps mental multitasking is the mind behaviour here that some AS people engage in. But the parallel nature of this tasking means that one mental task is not shut down before the other one fires up so that there may not be a lag and so there are two thought threads simeoltaneously. I have observed NTs who excel at multitasking are also using their bodies in a co-ordinated way, unlike some Aspies with co-ordination issues, like me.
Maybe this is why I prefer print as a means of receiving information.

I look forward to reading more about this issue here in this forum.

I do this a lot but I'm not sure if it's the same thing. I think I have built in responses that I keep on hand and it's almost like I skim the incoming information and start to throw out a response and then as I really think about what was said I realize I'm responding wrong. Like someone can be telling me about something that happened during their day and I'll be like "oh yeah..that's great!" Then suddenly I'll figure out they're telling me something bad and I'll have to start backpedaling. The worst case of this and one that I work on a lot is laughing. When I struggled more with socializing I got into this habit of laughing to buy time since most of my time out was spent with friends at parties where people are always joking. So I wind up laughing when someone insults me, or when they tell me something serious. It was a real problem for me for quite awhile.

I'm completely hopeless with names. I swear I intentionally try not to hear them sometimes. I think that's a matter of conserving processing power though as when I get tired I seem to try to filter out any non-essential information. If something doesn't specifically stand out about you or I don't expect to regularly interact with you I can't spend the resources it would take to focus and remember your name. That sounds pretty terrible but I'm pretty sure that's what's going on.